It was along one of these back streets that Harry tooled his hover cycle, enjoying anew the freedom from his normal Legion duties. Though he genuinely liked the uniforms Phule had provided for the company, it felt good to be back in his denims, threadbare but velvet soft from years of hard wear.
His arrival on Lorelei had been surprisingly easy, especially considering his current, disreputable appearance. The only difficulty he had encountered was in off-loading his beloved hover cycle. The spaceport officials were noticeably reluctant to allow it in the space station, and he had had to spend several hours filling out forms, initialing tersely phrased lists of rules and regulations, and, finally, paying several rounds of fees, duty charges, and deposits before they grudgingly cleared it for admission.
It didn’t take a genius to realize that much of the ordeal was specifically designed to frustrate the applicant to a point where he would be willing to simply store the vehicle until his departure, but Harry had used every trick in the book, as well as a few new ones, to keep his hover cycle while he was in the Legion, and he wasn’t about to pass using it now that he was back in civilian garb.
The reason for this “screening” was quickly apparent. All the air on Lorelei was recycled, and while the support systems were efficient enough to handle the monoxide generated by the people on the station, excessive engine use would have taxed it severely. Consequently there were few vehicles on Lorelei aside from the electric carts that shuttled gamblers back and forth along the Strip. The formula was simple: The limited air supply could support people or vehicles-and vehicles didn’t lose money at the tables.